Self-employment method
Nail salons
280,875 people filed as a nonemployer business under this industry code in 2022 — no payroll, no employees, just them. These are gross receipts reported to the IRS, before any expense is taken out.
Median GROSS RECEIPTS for the year — money in, before rent, materials, fuel, insurance or tax. This is not take-home pay.
Share who grossed under $10,000 for the whole year — before expenses.
The middle half, in gross receipts. A quarter of filers took less than the lower figure.
Source: US Census Bureau, Nonemployer Statistics 2022 · view
How often it does not work out
Of the 280,875 people who filed under this code in 2022, 19.12% grossed under $10,000 for the entire year — before a single expense was deducted.
That is a floor, not an estimate. Census publishes GROSS RECEIPTS, not net income. Everyone inside that share earned less than the figure suggests once rent, materials, mileage, insurance and self-employment tax came out — and filers who grossed well above the threshold may still have netted nothing. The true share of people who earn nothing meaningful from this is higher than the number above, never lower.
Denominator: establishments_total = 280,875 · US Census Bureau, Nonemployer Statistics 2022 · view
Every filer, by what they grossed
The full distribution Census publishes. The median above is interpolated inside the band that holds the 50th percentile.
| Gross receipts for the year | Filers | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Under $5,000 | 24,262 | 8.6% |
| $5,000 to $9,999 | 29,453 | 10.5% |
| $10,000 to $24,999 | 90,355 | 32.2% |
| $25,000 to $49,999 | 90,089 | 32.1% |
| $50,000 to $99,999 | 29,692 | 10.6% |
| $100,000 to $249,999 | 10,612 | 3.8% |
| $250,000 to $499,999 | 4,454 | 1.6% |
| $500,000 to $999,999 | 1,438 | 0.5% |
| $1,000,000 to $2,499,999 | 520 | 0.2% |
Who this suits
The median filer grossed $24,397, or $2,033 a month before expenses. That is an operating business at part-time scale: enough revenue to be worth running properly, not enough to be the only thing in the household.
At 280,875 filers, Nail salons is crowded. Crowding is survivable — most of those filers are not serious competitors — but it does mean the floor on price is set by people who are not costing their own time.
17,133 people — 6.1% of filers — grossed $100,000 or more. At that share the upper tier is visible from inside the field, which usually means someone doing Nail salons locally can tell you what those people do differently.
This work suits people who are good at keeping a client for years rather than winning one once, because the retention is the business.
There is no training requirement to file under this code — which is precisely why so many people appear in the bottom bands. Entry being free is not the same as the work being viable.
Who should not do this
3.4x between the quarters — $12,740 against $43,478, or $2,561 a month. This is the shape of a field where a minority does very well and the summary statistics quietly borrow their success.
The bottom quarter of Nail salons earns under $12,740 — $37,280 below the $50,020 a typical American job pays. Entering at the bottom and waiting is a live risk here, not a theoretical one, and some people never leave that quarter.
Do not start this without a client book already forming. Rent on a chair or a unit begins immediately; the referrals do not.
Of the 280,875 people who filed as Nail salons in 2022, 19.1% — about 53,703 of them — grossed under $10,000 for the entire year, before a single expense was deducted. That is the gentlest end of this dataset and it is still roughly one filer in four.
Take it as a floor, not an estimate. The $10,000 threshold is measured on money received, before materials, rent, fuel, insurance and self-employment tax, so the true share of filers who ended the year with no income is higher than the figure shown — we simply cannot say how much higher.
What the spread tells you
A ratio of 3.4x between the quarters is the signature of a winner-take-most distribution. $24,397 is a real number about a real population, but nobody entering Nail salons should plan around it.
In cash terms the middle half of Nail salons runs $12,740 to $43,478 — $30,738 a year between the 25th and 75th percentiles, against a midpoint of $24,397.
The 75th percentile is $43,478. Reaching it from the $24,397 midpoint is $19,081 a year; reaching it from the $12,740 that the bottom quarter of Nail salons earn is $30,738.
It is $11,657 from $24,397 down to $12,740 but $19,081 up to $43,478. When a range leans this far upward, the interesting question is what puts someone in the top half, because the money is disproportionately there.
Per hour of a full-time year, the middle of Nail salons takes $11.72 in revenue — $6.12 at the bottom quarter and $20.90 at the top. Costs have not been deducted from any of those figures, so none of them is an hourly wage.
Counted straight off the return: 24,262 filers grossed under $5,000, 29,453 took $5,000 to $9,999, 90,355 took $10,000 to $24,999, 17,024 cleared $100,000 and 6,412 cleared $250,000.
What these figures are, and what they are not
Every figure above is GROSS RECEIPTS, before expenses — money that arrived before rent, materials, fuel, insurance and self-employment tax. The $24,397 midpoint for Nail salons is not take-home pay and is not comparable to a $24,397 salary.
Treat the per-hour figure as a conversion. It assumes a flat full-time year against $24,397 because we have no verified record of unpaid hours or out-of-pocket costs for this work, and we would rather convert honestly than adjust invented ones.
How this is calculated · Self-employment failure rates · What credentials cost and pay back · Look up something else